Wednesday, March 12, 2014

LEGO LAND

Well, the day our ICF was dropped off was an adventure in and of itself. I was away at Young Woman's camp for three days and knew Jeremy would want to be at the site every day possible as we were racing against the clock to get as much done in the summer before he had to return to work--I hired a babysitter to watch the boys while I was at YW camp. Already feeling a bit guilty and torn about leaving when we had just barely started our big house-building scramble and knowing that I was the only member of Jeremy's "crew" so he would be on his own at the site, I had my doubts about what was the "right" thing to do….go to camp, or support my family. It seemed a huge sacrifice at the time for our family, but even though it was a stake camp, I wanted to support the YW president and the girls and get to know them a little better.
And so the morning of YW camp, they picked me up at the site (trying to squeeze in a few hours of work before camp) and away I went.
I thought about my family all day long at camp. I knew that the ICF was going to be delivered that day and that Jeremy had already arranged to take the babysitter home around 7:00 pm so that he could get in as much building at the site as possible. So, I anxiously waited until 9:30 pm to try calling him that evening and checking in on how everything went that day.
At first I couldn't get through to him at home so I tried calling his cell…after the second attempt the phone picked up but all I could hear was a tonne of wind and a flurry of business, but no voice on the other end. I was so confused. At this time, Jeremy should not be at the site still…the babysitter should be gone and the boys should all be snug in bed.
I started to worry a bit. I hung up the phone and tried calling the house again…no answer…I tried Jeremy's cell a few more times. Finally he answered and in a panicked voice he said "I can't talk now, there are tornado warnings here right now and the ICF is all blowing away and getting banged up…I am out here trying to get it all tied down."….Ahhh, tornado warnings…where are the boys? Our rental house does not have a basement so the ICF was not my top concern when I heard "Tornado warning"…Jeremy said the boys were at home (just 2 minutes down the road). He had had Walden waiting in the car as he scurried around the site, but Walden was crying so much he ran him home and woke up Chaim (6 years old at the time) to have him watch Walden while dad went back to the site.
I walked back to the camp fire not just worried but starting to feel a little panicked. When the other leaders asked how things were at home I nervously told them that my 6 year old was babysitting during a tornado warning while Jeremy tried to save our building supplies.
I am sure both Jeremy and I were saying many prayers that night, and in the end, the boys all survived and so did our ICF…It was on site, Jeremy had managed to save it from being too banged up…The babysitter had survived a long day in a one-bedroom house with three wild boys and the boys had survived being babysat by their 6 year old brother during a tornado warning…and I had survived a near nervous break-down at YW camp (I would like to think I held it together pretty good).
By the time Camp was over, we were ready to start building. ICF is like big blocks of styrofoam lego. We staged the bundles of ICF where we were going to need them and began laying block. Jeremy would cut the blocks and lay them and I would help lay them, pound them down and tie them together with zip ties. Jeremy, would then come behind me and tighten the zip ties with a pair of pliers to ensure they were nice and snug.
Little by little the exterior walls of our home started going up and we were the ones doing it, while the boys ran amuck on the site. So, while we were busy doing that:

The boys were busy doing this:

P.S., the picture with Jeremy on the scaffolding shows our window bucks. The house actually has a lot of windows on the south side (all part of passive solar heating)…I was impressed and grateful that Jeremy was able to build and figure out all the dimensions for the doorways and window openings. It was a lot of extra work for him to build the window bucks and know where they were supposed to go. I definitely would not be able to do that!